Staff

Director, Race Equity Assessment

Mercedes Brown

Mercedes Brown is the Director of Race Equity Assessment at the Building Movement Project. In this new role, she is charged with launching and bringing to scale BMP’s new organizational race equity assessment process to better equip the nonprofit sector with the foundational capacities needed to build more racially equitable workplaces. Mercedes brings deep expertise in public policy, data analytics, and equitable cross-systems transformation through nearly 17 years of experience in the social services sector. Throughout her career in government and the nonprofit sector, she has always led with her passion for advancing social and racial justice through complex systems change.

Before joining the Building Movement Project staff, she served as Michigan Director at the Corporation for Supportive Housing (CSH), where she established CSH’s strategic priorities for the State of Michigan and managed a statewide portfolio of cross-sector projects aimed at ensuring equitable access to high-quality housing and services for marginalized communities. Mercedes holds a Master’s in Social Work from the University of Michigan, where she currently works as a part-time lecturer teaching policy and community organizing courses. She also holds a Juris Doctor from Western Michigan University. Mercedes serves on the Board of Directors for the Washtenaw Housing Alliance and the United Way of Washtenaw County’s Community Impact Committee. In her spare time, Mercedes enjoys baking, dabbling in interior design work, and traveling with her fiancé.

Senior Director, Detroit People’s Platform

Linda S. Campbell

Linda Campbell works on Building Movement Project’s Nonprofits and Social Change project with groups in Detroit, Michigan, and throughout the U.S. and Canada. Linda leads Building Movement Detroit and provides technical assistance and capacity building to nonprofit agencies and resident-led organizations. Prior to her consulting work, Linda served in a variety of senior and executive positions in the nonprofit and government sectors. She was the executive director for one of NYC’s oldest AIDS service organizations, Minority Task Force on AIDS, and a senior director at both the Michigan Public Health Institute and the National Center for Health Education. She served as a founding board member for several community-based nonprofits. In the past two years, Linda has provided planning assistance to local African American Health Institute initiatives in Michigan. Linda holds a master’s degree in public health from the University of Michigan.

Research Coordinator

Tessa Constantine

After working with the Building Movement Project as the research and data intern, Tessa joined the BMP staff full-time as a research analyst. Before joining BMP, Tessa worked as a student researcher at Carthage College where she collaborated with the Shalom Center local food pantry, using data analysis and mapping software to target areas of need in the local inner city, eventually establishing a series of hot meal sites for local food pantry recipients. Tessa has several years of research experience, including a series of large-scale surveys on perceptions of diversity, equity, and inclusion within a higher education campus community. Tessa received a bachelor’s degree in sociology and psychology from Carthage College in Kenosha, W.I. in 2018 and her master’s from Columbia University in sociology in 2019, where her research interests mainly centered on indigenous peoples’ rights, particularly indigenous language revitalization.

Finance, Grants and Operations Manager

Maggie Deptola

Maggie Deptola (she/her) is the Finance, Grants and Operations Manager for the Building Movement Project. She is responsible for building and maintaining systems that support the organization’s administrative functions. 

Maggie is passionate about economic mobility, educational equity, and capacity-building for nonprofits. Her previous roles include consulting with local and state governments on topics such as capacity-building and program design, a brief stint in tech, and supporting a variety of nonprofits in program and operations roles. Most recently, she served as the first Chief Operating Officer of Coded by Kids, a Philadelphia-based tech education nonprofit serving K-12 students ages in the mid-Atlantic region. 

Maggie has a bachelor’s degree in international area studies from Drexel University and a master’s degree in Public Administration from the University of Pennsylvania. She serves as the Vice Chair of the Philadelphia Robotics Coalition. 

Senior Director, Strategic Initiatives

Deepa Iyer

Over the course of two decades supporting social movements, Deepa has played many roles: weaver, frontline responder, storyteller, and guide. Her political and community homes include Asian American, South Asian, Muslim, and Arab ecosystems where she spent fifteen years in policy advocacy and coalition building in the wake of the September 11th attacks and ensuing backlash. 

Deepa leads projects on solidarity and social movements at the Building Movement Project, a national nonprofit organization that catalyzes social change through research, relationships, and resources. She conducts trainings, uplifts narratives through the Solidarity Is This podcast, and facilitates solidarity strategy for cohorts and networks. Previously, she served as executive director of South Asian Americans Leading Together (SAALT) for a decade, and also held positions at Race Forward, the US Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division, the Asian Pacific American Legal Resource Center, and the Asian American Justice Center. 

Deepa’s first book, We Too Sing America: South Asian, Arab, Muslim, and Sikh Immigrants Shape Our Multiracial Future (The New Press, 2015), chronicles community-based histories in the wake of 9/11 and received a 2016 American Book Award. Deepa’s second book, a guide based on the social change ecosystem map, is available in late 2022 (Social Change Now: A Guide for Reflection and Connection is available here).

Deepa serves on the advisory council of the Emergent Fund. She has been an adjunct professor at the University of Maryland in the Asian American Studies and Public Policy programs.

Deepa is an immigrant who moved to Kentucky from Kerala (India) when she was twelve years old. She graduated from the University of Notre Dame Law School and Vanderbilt University. In her free time, Deepa loves to make memories with her son, share random tips about astrology with her patient friends, read, and discover a new series to binge.

Co-Executive Director

Frances Kunreuther

Frances Kunreuther co-directs the Building Movement Project, strengthening U.S. nonprofits as sites of civic engagement and social change. She is co-author of two books, From the Ground Up: Grassroots Organizations Making Social Change (Cornell, 2006) and Working Across Generations: Defining the Future of Nonprofit Leadership (Jossey Bass, 2009). Frances was a senior fellow at the Hauser Center for Nonprofit Organizations at Harvard University for five years and is currently affiliated with the Research Center for Leadership and Action at NYU where she also teaches. In the 1990s, Frances headed the Hetrick-Martin Institute for LBGT youth and was awarded an Annie E. Casey Foundation Fellowship for her work with homeless youth and families, undocumented immigrants, crime victims, battered women, and substance users. She writes and presents frequently on issues related to nonprofits, leadership, and social change.

Communications and Operations Associate

Jasmine Leeward

Jasmine (they/them) serves as the Communications and Operations Associate at Building Movement Project. Jasmine develops communications strategies, performs operational and administrative tasks, and supports various projects across the organization.

Jasmine is a visual artist and storyteller committed to the delicate work of challenging state violence and shifting culture towards Black liberation, particularly in the U.S. South. Jasmine has worked as a communications strategist in different movement formations since 2016. They are a 2021 Rockwood Leadership JustFilms fellow and a 2022 Broadway Advocacy Coalition Artivism Fellow.

Data and Research Intern

LaShayla Lumpkins

LaShayla Lumpkins (they/them) serves as the research and data intern for the Building Movement Project. Prior to joining BMP, LaShayla has worked as an intern for Asakura Robinson, a planning, landscape architecture, and urban design firm. After graduating from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette with a B.S. in architecture, they moved to Minneapolis, Minnesota to pursue a master of urban and regional planning from the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. LaShayla is passionate about centering Black, queer, and trans individuals in their work as a graduate student and is bringing that same passion to BMP. They continue to express their passion for community building through creative outlets such as podcasting, photography, and videography.

Networks and Learning Practice Coordinator

Olivia Peña

As the Networks and Learning Practice Coordinator, Olivia Peña supports informational initiatives and peer learning communities across BMP’s different areas of work. Olivia focuses largely on Building Blocks for Change, BMP’s race equity assessment through developing participant engagement and community building efforts. She has been a proud member of the BMP team since 2020.

Before joining the Building Movement Project, Olivia supported food security initiatives across the state of Vermont, worked for the United States Senate, and conducted research from state to international scales. She studied at the University of Vermont, earning Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Food Systems. Olivia has supported and published research on topics including community engagement, racial equity, resilience, advocacy, and climate change mitigation. She is active in her local community, working closely with communities of color to advance racial equity and justice through food and land.

Senior Research Manager

Lisa Ramadhar

Lisa Ramadhar is the Senior Research Manager at Building Movement Project. She is a changemaker who uses inquiry to define problems and identify solutions to social issues. Led by her inquisitiveness, Lisa has built a career in research and evaluation, supporting projects in various sectors by illuminating patterns and insights that drive decision-making and solutions. Most recently, her work focused on embedding equity in a local government agency. As senior evaluator and acting director of that project, Lisa identified pay parity and living wage as key equity goals, and worked with her team and a group of changemakers across the agency to successfully advocate for leadership to address those inequities. Having worked on equity issues in large and complex organizations, Lisa is skilled at devising mixed methods research projects that aim to uncover the full story and inform strategic solutions.

Lisa has also served on the Steering Committee of Jahajee Sisters. Jahajee Sisters is a movement building organization that uses arts activism to eliminate gender-based violence in Indo-Caribbean communities. As an Indo-Guyanese immigrant and survivor, this is deeply personal work for her.

Lisa brings her curiosity, experience with strategic planning and culture change, and love of people and community to her work at Building Movement Project to strengthen the nonprofit sector.

Race Equity Assessment Associate

Camryn Snell

Camryn Snell (she/hers) serves as the Race Equity Assessment Associate for the Building Movement Project. In this role, Camryn is charged with supporting the launch and development of the BB4C, BMP’s race equity assessment for nonprofit organizations. Ultimately, she aspires to motivate and support nonprofits in their development of the foundational capacities necessary for building more racially equitable workplaces. Camryn firmly believes that the current workplace culture is a reflection of our popular culture. As such, she hopes that these shifts will be realized throughout our communities.Camryn brings both lived and learned experiences to this role. The intersections of Camryn‘s identities make her uniquely prepared and knowledgeable of the necessity of normalizing, organizing, and operationalizing race equity efforts in all spaces. Before joining BMP, she attended the College of Charleston where she earned a Master of Public Administration degree. There, Camryn also served in the Community Assistance Program, a high-level capacity building clinic that serves nonprofit and municipal organizations. She co-managed four social-justice based projects and had hands-on experience with dismantling inequities, specifically  White Supremacy Culture, in workplaces in addition to fervently advocating for greater representation of Black and African-American people in Charleston’s prominent industries. Camryn also co-led the cultivation of the City of Charleston‘s first-ever Race Equity Framework. Prior to this, Camryn earned a Bachelor of Art in both Political Science and Spanish at the College of Charleston.  Camryn deeply values equity-oriented service and works to ensure that communities have the necessary tools and resources to affect sustainable change.

New Mexico Coordinator

Leah Steimel

Leah Steimel coordinates New Mexico-based program efforts for Building Movement Project and has guided the development and implementation of the Common Good Action Project (CGAP) since its inception in 2015. Steimel has worked in the field of community health for over 30 years, with an emphasis on program design and policy advocacy to serve underserved and marginalized populations. After working in Latin America for eight years, she moved to New Mexico in 1995 where she led programs and initiatives at the University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center focused on addressing health disparities and access to care for immigrants, Native Americans, and adults living in poverty. Steimel then served as executive director of a non-profit organization serving immigrants in southeast Albuquerque, and as executive director of a free clinic for uninsured children in Santa Fe, NM, before returning to UNM in 2006 as founding director of the Office of Community Affairs.  There, she facilitated broad stakeholder participation in program planning and advocacy to leverage public funding for a new community-based program to connect poor and disconnected adults to health and social services. The program, Pathways to a Healthy Bernalillo County, has continuously operated through local nonprofit organizations for over 10 years and has served thousands of adults in the city. Steimel formed an independent consultant business in 2013 and works with nonprofit organizations and government entities. Steimel received a Master’s degree from Tulane University School of Public Health & Tropical Medicine in 1989.

Co-Executive Director

Sean Thomas-Breitfeld

Sean Thomas-Breitfeld co-directs the Building Movement Project. Prior to joining the BMP staff, Sean spent a decade working in various roles at Community Change, where he developed training programs for grassroots leaders, worked in the communications and policy departments where he coordinated online and grassroots advocacy efforts, and lobbied on a range of issues, including immigration reform, transportation equity, and anti-poverty programs. Before joining Community Change, Sean worked as a policy analyst at UnidosUS, where he focused on employment and income security issues. Sean holds a Master’s in Public Administration from NYU’s Wagner School of Public Service and a bachelor’s degree in social work and multicultural studies from St. Olaf College in Minnesota.

Coordinator, Movement Building Programs

UyenThi Tran Myhre

UyenThi (pronounced “Wing-T”) Tran Myhre (she/her) is the Movement Building Associate with the Building Movement Project, supporting communications work, curriculum development and trainings, and solidarity cohorts. 

Prior to joining BMP, UyenThi held leadership roles at the YMCA of the North Equity Innovation Center and the University of Minnesota Women’s Center, where she worked with college students, K-12 and higher education faculty and staff, as well as nonprofit professionals in various sectors. She holds a Bachelor’s in Journalism and Certificate in Gender and Women’s Studies from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a Master’s in Educational Psychology from the University of Minnesota.

UyenThi is interested in storytelling and narrative-shifting as strategies for social change and creating a better world. She is part of the team at Project Yellow Dress, a platform uplifting voices and stories from the Southeast Asian diaspora. As a daughter of refugees, writer, and facilitator, her work explores the intersections of family, feminism, abolition, and beyond, often through a pop culture lens.